Nigel walked around the woods of the Triassic heading down towards the beach. "The Triassic is a crucial time for marine life." Nigel tells the cameraman as he walks across. "The fish aren't exactly the most fearsome animals in the ocean at this time. This sea is dominated by a group that used to just live on the land, the reptiles."
Reptiles dominate everywhere, winged reptiles like these pterosaurs known as Eudimorphodon rule the sky. The future lords of the land, the dinosaurs have also just appeared, though they are not much to look at yet. Dinosaurs like Plateosaurus and Liliensternus roam the land.
Nigel passes by a small herd of Plateosaurus browsing from the trees close to the beach, while a Liliensternus ran across the beach, scavenging on whatever sea washes up next. Nigel got onto the boat. Nigel was here to explore life in the sea. Home to the largest Triassic reptiles of them all.
Fortunately, sea reptiles are easy enough to spot because unlike fish, they have to come up for air. Nigel spots a medium sized aquatic reptile with teeth like an alligator, a relatively long neck and had colors similar to the green sea turtle of modern times.
His first sighting was a Nothosaurus. Nigel was getting ready to dive with these tremendous animals. "The Nothosaurs can be nippy but there's much bigger sea reptiles out there that can easily kill a person." Nigel tells the cameraman. "So this is my insurance policy, an electric cattle prod. If anything comes to close this should discourage them."
Nigel dove down into the beautiful baby blue Triassic waters. It was a beautiful sight to behold. The Triassic was not only the time of marine reptiles but also the time of coral reefs which made the waters here more vibrant than the Devonian and Ordovician seas. These coral reefs are the home to an assortment of animals a vast majority of them being marine reptiles. Though the first creature Nigel sees on his dive is a creature which kind of resembles a turtle but with a square shaped shell.
"Ah, these little fellas must be Henodus." Nigel said to the cameraman. "They may look like turtles but these are actually a type of placodont. Placodonts are a common group of marine reptile at this time and they usually fed on molluscs, which is why their flat and could crush shells."
The Henodus swam around the reef while Nigel watched them. Eventually he left behind the Henodus to search for the Nothosaurus which weren't too far away. "Look at that, there's not just one Nothosaur there's a pair of them." Nigel told the cameraman. "They're inquisitive, coming closer and closer they're so curious."
The Nothosaurus swam around Nigel observing him as they slithered through the water. "I don't know how they're going to react, so I'm glad I've got this electric prod in case they become just too inquisitive." Nigel tells the cameraman. "But at the moment, they're just curious just circling around me."
"But you wouldn't want those teeth in your arms." Nigel tells the cameraman as another Nothosaurus swims around him. "Those teeth are a perfect fish trap and they move fast enough to catch the fish that are around here."
The Nothosaurus nudges Nigel playfully and he waits for the other one. "There's one coming close now and I'm going to try something." Nigel tells the cameraman as another Nothosaur swims towards him. "Like with alligators there's only one safe way to hold a Nothosaur and that's around the jaws."
Nigel gets a hold of the Nothosaurus and gets a good look at the reptile. "Wow, what a beautiful creature." Nigel says as he holds on to it. "They can close those jaws with tremendous force but the muscles that open them are really weak. But Nothosaurs like all sea reptiles they have to get up to the surface so I can't hold him for too long."
"I'm going to let him go now." Nigel said as he let go of the Nothosaurus letting it swim off with its companion. "Go on boy, off you go." Nigel found himself following another creature swimming amongst the coral reef. This creature had a long neck almost like the Nothosaurus. It was only slightly smaller than the Nothosaurus but had flippers instead of feet and looked like a mini version of the Loch Ness monster.
"Get a load of this magnificent creature." Nigel says to the cameraman. "While this isn't dangerous this is the an early ancestor of the group of long necked sea reptiles called plesiosaurs. This guy is a Pistosaurus."
Nigel followed the Pistosaurus as it swam around the reef, soon leading him into deeper water. "These guys likely would have hunted similarly to smaller plesiosaurs like polycotylids, they would have chased down fish something like some large fish like swordfish do in modern times." Nigel says as he follows the Pistosaurus.
Suddenly the Pistosaurus swims away as it notices something big approaching it. Suddenly Nigel is startled by a large blue marine reptile. "Whoa, where did that come from ?" Nigel said as he saw the large creature swimming around him. "I think it's a Cymbospondylus, part of the group of dolphin like marine reptiles known as the ichthyosaurs."
"This guy is a primitive member of the group but despite that he is one of the more formidable predators in these Triassic seas." Nigel explains to the cameraman holding the cattle prod in front of him and keeping an eye on the hungry Cymbospondylus. "I need to keep an eye on this guy as he's coming a little too close."
The Cymbospondylus approaches Nigel as he and the cameraman quickly back away from it, pointing the cattle prod at the hungry ichthyosaur. "Ichthyosaurs first appeared 250 million years will be around until 90 million years later where they went extinct, their roles filled by the polycotylids."
"I need to get back to the boat but I've got to keep an eye on him." Nigel tells the cameraman. The Cymbospondylus tries to attack Nigel only to be stopped by the electric prod which discourages him, albeit briefly. Nigel and the cameraman swam towards the boat but the Cymbospondylus follows them to the boat. Nigel pushes it away with the cattle prod which discourages the Cymbospondylus away from the boat.
"What a spectacular reptile." Nigel says as he watches it swimming away from the boat and back out into deeper water.
While Nigel escaped the jaws of the Cymbospondylus, They've yet to reach their half way mark through their voyage through prehistory. Ahead of them now are four more ever deadlier encounters. Next lies the Jurassic which is about 152 million years before the modern day. The Jurassic is right in the middle of the time of the dinosaurs and is home to the most colossal animals to ever live on land. Some of them outweighed only by the monsters that live in the water.
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So that's all the Triassic has in store up next is the Jurassic but this predator isn't going to be Liopleurodon but instead a younger relative to Liopleurodon but also a larger relative too. If you have any questions about this series as well as the other two I'd be happy to answer them.
